


Race You

by birlcholtz (justwhatialwayswanted)



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Gen, omgcp friendship week 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-06
Updated: 2020-10-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:21:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26862061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justwhatialwayswanted/pseuds/birlcholtz
Summary: Art shows are fucking awful. So is applying to law school. But they'll figure it out.
Relationships: Larissa "Lardo" Duan & Shitty Knight
Comments: 2
Kudos: 17





	Race You

**Author's Note:**

> Day 2: Stress

Lardo has a key to the Haus, and she uses it all the time, but usually she doesn't use it at two in the morning.

Shitty's light is still on—his window is one bright square on the second floor, but it looks (and sounds) like everyone else is asleep.

That's good. She hates looking like a tangled ball of stress in front of everyone else. It's hard to be chill when she wants to pull all her hair out and scream about this  _ fucking _ art show. Shitty's still up, which means he's probably freaking out about law school applications, which means misery loves company and she's going to knock politely before barging into his room with the half-full bag of gummy bears she brought with her and they can complain together until one or the other of them is too tired to be stressed and falls asleep.

It's happened before.

Lardo unlocks the door and steps inside as quietly as she can so she doesn't wake anybody up. Sure, she's planning to talk to Shitty, which generally involves volume, but she can at least avoid slamming doors.

By the time she's walked up the stairs, Shitty has poked his head out of his room to see who's coming up, and when he sees Lardo, he says quietly, "Fuck, you're psychic. I was about to text you." He withdraws back into his room, and she follows him.

She also immediately spots his laptop on his desk, which is open to a page detailing acceptance rates to the top ten law schools in the United States. "Dude."

Shitty flops backwards onto his bed and rubs his hands over his face. It's cold enough this time of year that he's paired his boxers with a Samwell sweatshirt. "I know."

Lardo pulls out her bag of gummy bears and sits down next to him. "You submitted everything already. That's just going to make it worse."

"And yet here we are." He snags a gummy bear and pops it in his mouth without looking at the color. "So let me inquire. We know why I'm up in the middle of the night, why are  _ you _ up in the middle of the night?"

"Art show," Lardo says simply.

He nods. "Does your theme still feel weird?"

Right on the nose as usual. " _ So _ weird." She sighs. "It's just not, like, what I feel like I'm actually trying to say. Something's off about it and I have no idea what. I've been staring at my sketches since I finished dinner and I decided to come over here instead of ripping them up." She bites down on a gummy bear with probably more force than necessary.

"Smart."

"Thanks."

Shitty contemplates the ceiling. "Maybe we both need to just do something batshit. Like if it's off-the-walls enough, it'll reset our brains and we can chill out for half a second."

Lardo shrugs and takes another gummy bear. "I mean, nothing else has worked."

"Exactly. Fuck rationality." He sits up. "I will race you to the Pond right now, and whoever jumps in first wins the rest of that bag."

"It's gonna be  _ freezing." _ Lardo glances at the gummy bears. "But, honestly, there are enough left that it's worth it. I'm gonna leave my phone here so it doesn't get wet. Put some pants on, though."

"You say the cruelest things." But he does.

Shitty almost wins the race, but Lardo elbows him in the side at the last second and cannonballs into the Pond. It's so cold that she knows her teeth will be chattering when she gets out, but she discovers she doesn't care.

When she comes up for air, she's laughing.


End file.
